Political class in meltdown because Trump took a phone call from Taiwan's leader

Get used to this: America elects a president who does not do things in conventional ways, in large part because Americans have lost faith in the political class's conventional ways of doing things. So here comes the new president, not following convention because he has little use for it. The political class, which despises this man and refuses to accept that there could possibly be anything wrong with the way they've always done things, reacts to the new president's every eschewing of convention by proclaiming: He's so stupid! He doesn't know how things are done!

Oh he knows. But he also knows that the way things are done has not produced good results. Case in point: For more than six decades, America has provided for the defense of Taiwan against communist China, even as we go through the absurd exercise of pretending not to notice that Taiwan is an independent nation. It is, in fact, the remnants of China before the communist revolution, and Beijing has insisted the entire time that Taiwan really belongs to them. So as not to upset the Chinese communists, who we don't want to upset for some reason (perhaps the fact that we owe them $800 billion), no American president has spoken to a Taiwanese president since the 1970s. To do so would imply diplomatic recognition, and that's icky and would irritate China. The result of following this policy for decades has been . . .? Nothing good. The Chinese are still communist controlled, and they still work against our strategic interests in every conceivable way. So along comes Donald Trump, who decides that the old way of doing things doesn't necessarily need to be his way. And he takes a phone call from the president of Taiwan, even though conventional wisdom says this is simply not done. Trump does it anyway And as you might have expected, the political class goes insane:

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One of the chief concerns of President-elect Donald Trump's detractors during the presidential campaign was that the brash and notoriously loose-lipped real estate executive wouldn't be able to handle the delicate balancing act that is diplomacy. It's one thing to make wild claims domestically; it's another to inflame a fellow world power with a careless word or two. Today, a fellow world power — China — is inflamed. And Trump's controversial conversation with Taiwan's leader, which broke nearly four decades of protocol when it comes to U.S.-China relations, harks back to another controversial bit of diplomacy: Trump's first big foreign visit as the Republican nominee to Mexico. That visit erupted into a major political problem for Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, and by the end of it, the two sides were offering different versions of what had happened. Similarly, Trump and Taiwan seem to be at-odds about precisely what just occurred. . . . "Of course both sides agreed ahead of time before making contact" spokesman Alex Huang said in response to Trump's tweet. Taiwan's government also said the two sides discussed "strengthening bilateral relations” and talked about their "close economic, political and security ties" -- all words likely to make China cringe and suggestive of a more in-depth conversation than just a congratulatory call.

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So China is "inflamed" because Trump talked to someone they don't want him talking to. Too damn bad. China will have to calm down. It sounds like the new administration has no intention of constantly walking on eggshells lest they upset the communist rulers of a nation that acts against our interests on a regular basis. And despite what the media would have you believe, Trump is not some ignorant bumpkin running around doing things because he doesn't know any better. Trump knows perfectly well that what he's doing represents a change in the established protocol. And that's exactly why he's doing it:

Interesting how the U.S. sells Taiwan billions of dollars of military equipment but I should not accept a congratulatory call.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2016

With that one tweet, what Trump illustrates is that he knows perfectly well what the established custom is - and he considers it totally absurd. Because it is. Everyone knows we not only consider Taiwan an independent nation, but we consider it a crucial ally and we - almost alone - provide the assurance that Taiwan cannot and will not be invaded by mainland communist China. Yet we engage in this idiotic charade of never talking to Taiwan's leader in order to maintain some sort of diplomatic illusion that will keep the communists from getting publicly faced? Screw that. Things work differently now. And if China wants special considerations out of the United States, maybe they will have to start earning them. That's how you behave when you really believe that you're a leader on the world stage. You behave like other countries should be trying not to upset you, not the other way around. Far from the departing president who isn't interested in American leadership or America winning, the new way is for America to boldly lead and expect punk countries like China to treat us with respect. This isn't how the U.S. political class thinks. Trump is entirely aware of that. And he thinks it's stupid as hell. Because it is. Or I should say, it was. That nonsense is over now.